Ambassador Engo dies

THE death has occurred of Ambassador Paul Bamela Engo of the Cameroons at the age of 79. The late Justice Engo was educated at Foreigners School and Edo College, Benin, Nigeria with Chief Tayo Akpata.

After qualifying as a lawyer in the UK with the late Justice Ephraim Akpata, he joined the Nigerian Federal Ministry of Justice in Lagos with the late Justice Agoro as his contemporary. A notable sportsman of Grier Cup fame, he represented Nigeria in triple jump at the Melbourne Australian Olympic Games in 1956 with Chief J K Randle as Chef de Mission.

After the UN Plebiscite in 1963 he remained in the Cameroons where he joined the foreign service and rose to the position of the Ambassador to the United Nations in New York.

He was the Chairman of the Sixth Committee which prepared the ground work for the law of the sea. In 1990, he was appointed to the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea in Hamburg Germany where he served until his death.

He will be buried in Ebolowa, Cameroons on 29 May 2010. He is survived by Mrs Ruth Engo, children and a brother, Chief Hope Harriman.